Ipswich Town boss Kieran McKenna says his charges have to be ready to scrap as they head to Port Vale tonight (7.45pm).

The high-flying Blues saw off promotion rivals Derby County in front of the Sky TV cameras on Friday night, and now head to Vale Park for the first of two consecutive away days. Charlton Athletic await on Saturday.

And Town's manager said he's expecting a difficult game at the 14th-placed Valiants, who won promotion from League Two last season and are unbeaten in their last four games in all competitions.

"They've done well," he said. "Points-wise, with their game in hand, they'd be in a really good position.

"They've started well. A difficult team, some players that I know, a manager I haven't come across but has done very well in his career so far.

"They're going to be a difficult team.

"They have physicality, they press well, they try to be aggressive and they're doing really well in their set plays, so it's going to be a challenge - a challenging pitch as well, which is probably the first time we're going to encounter that, but we're going to have that through the winter months, so that gives us another challenge and something that we have to be ready for.

"All in all, it's a Tuesday night game up at Port Vale - we know we're in for a fight and we're going to have to be right at it to get a result."

Asked if the extra day of rest will help his side, having played on Friday night instead of Saturday afternoon, McKenna added: "Hopefully it will be helpful.

"Of course we have a bit of travel with this one and Saturday-Tuesdays aren't easy, so it gives us an extra few hours - every hour makes a difference when you've got the Saturday-Tuesdays, so it's useful.

"It means we can train a little bit more on Monday and make sure that we're as ready as we can be."